8/06/2007 @ 3:26PM

Brush Up On Office Etiquette

The workplace bathroom is no longer just for, well, going to the bathroom.

Like the gym bathroom, the office restroom has become a home-away-from-home bathroom. At any given time, someone is in there brushing their teeth, flossing, blow-drying, hair straightening and sometimes even shaving. Simply put, if you’re looking for a quiet place to think, you might as well think again.

Longer workdays are partly to blame. For employees who work late and then have an evening function, they want to smell fresh and look clean. Others dont want to fight rush-hour traffic, so they leave home at the crack of dawn and complete their morning hygiene regimen at the office.

Some companies now require their executives and other staffers who have significant client interaction to brush their teeth before a meeting. Jacqueline Whitmore, author of Business Class: Etiquette Essentials for Success at Work says one of her wealth management clients asked that she lead a seminar on proper personal hygiene for the workplace.

“My clients would rather see their employees brush teeth at work than breathe dragon breath on their clients,” says Whitmore, who leads etiquette seminars through The Protocol School of Palm Beach.

This mentality is hardly restricted to the upper ranks of the corporate world. Melissa O’Brien, a career counselor at a private college in Connecticut, views it as a public service of sorts. She doesn’t want to offend anyone with after-lunch breath. “It’s out of mutual respect,” says O’Brien, who has brushed on-the-go since she was in college.

This is what Cleveland-area dentist Matthew Messina calls “social brushing.” “It’s a 30- to 45-second wave of the toothbrush across visible parts of the teeth,” he says. And while that’s fine for eliminating food particles and odors, he’s quick to remind that the American Dental Association recommends twice daily brushings and once a day flossing to remove plaque and bacteria.

People who brush their teeth at work don’t necessarily do so for the reason you might expect. Take Jacqueline F. Gray, assistant public information officer for the City Council of Birmingham, Ala. She brushes daily at work to prevent herself from eating the sweets and baked items that frequently make their way into the office.

Like with orange juice, “Once you brush your teeth, sweets don’t taste as good for some reason,” says Gray, a workplace tooth-brusher for about five years.

As anyone who works in a large office knows, the workplace restroom is sometimes less than desirable. Gray has learned to contend with that issue. “It grosses me out if the smell is bad in the bathroom, and I’ll search out a restroom on a different floor,” she says. “I put the time in after lunch to brush my teeth. Sometimes I have to go from floor to floor.”

Speaking of being grossed out, there’s another reason she brushes. Gray has attended more than one meeting in which the presenter has food particles stuck in his or her teeth. She never wants to be that person, and a mint doesn’t always kill the piece of lettuce wedged between your teeth.

“It seems like mints are adding more stuff than cleaning,” she says. “And mouthwash is too harsh. You stand next to your boss and you smell like you’re trying to hide something. Toothpaste is minty perfect.”

“It’s preposterous,” says Trunk. “You don’t have bad breath just from existing during the day. Have a mint after lunch, and brush your teeth at night.” She goes on to say that being that attentive to hygiene may be a sign of a larger problem than bad breath. “It’s a sign of perfectionism and that’s one of the biggest causes of depression at work,” Trunk says. “It’s like you’re chasing a carrot you can never reach. You can’t always be perfect at work, but you do the best you can. It seems innocuous, but it’s obsessive.”

That may be true, but what if someone points it out? Chuck Schotta is a licensed specialist in school psychology in Bridgeport, Texas, and has had more than one child tell him he has coffee breath. “I handle those remarks with humor,” says Schotta, who now brushes at work daily. “I say, ‘I know, and can you smell the onions?’ Since I started brushing my teeth it’s a non-issue.”

Aside from having fresh breath, Schotta likes to be presentable in other ways too. Since it’s so hot in Texas, he generally stops in the men’s room for a midday freshening up that includes applying a dash more aftershave, brushing his hair and washing his face.

Luckily, most schools have single bathrooms for the faculty. Still, “most men’s rooms are notoriously nasty.” To combat that, he puts a paper towel onto the counter and then places his toothbrush on top of it instead of putting it on the bare counter.

Matthew Giles thinks of his workplace bathroom routine similarly. He works in a credit union in Brisbane, Australia, and in the summer when it’s 86 degrees, by the time he leaves for work, he gets quite sweaty en route. (Giles walks to the train station and then from the station to work.)

He found a space in the office to store lockers and he keeps all his “freshening-up” equipment there. That includes a week’s worth of freshly pressed work attire. Giles goes to work in casual clothes and shaves, bathes and changes when he gets there.

Trunk may not approve, but Giles says his co-workers prefer him smelling clean.